MOHALI, India (AP) — Virat Kohli masterminded a big win for Royal Challengers Bengaluru but Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s Chennai Super Kings lost heavily again in the Indian Super League.
Chennai’s woeful season continued when Rohit Sharma and Suryakumar Yadav powered the Mumbai Indians to a nine-wicket victory later Sunday and into sixth place in the standings with a third consecutive win. Chennai remains at the bottom of the table with just two wins after eight games.
Kohli’s fourth half-century of the season led Bengaluru to a commanding seven-wicket win in the earlier match, scoring an unbeaten 73 from 54 balls to help his team reach 159-3 in reply to Punjab's 157-6.
The Sharma and Yadav Show
Rohit Sharma finally ended his run of poor scores with an unbeaten 76 off 45 balls – his first half-century of the season -- and Yadav made an aggressive 68 not out off 30 balls as Mumbai romped to 177-1 in 15.4 overs.
Chennai had earlier scored 176-5 with Ravindra Jadeja (53 not out) and Shivam Dube (50) scoring the bulk of the runs while 17-year-old Ayush Mhatre showed plenty of promise in hitting 32 off 15 balls.
Sharma and Yadav plundered an aggressive 114-run stand off just 54 balls at the Wankhede stadium.
After sharing a 63-run opening stand with Ryan Rickelton, who should have been out lbw in the second over to Khaleel Ahmed, Sharma combine with Yadav.
Sharma hit six sixes and four boundaries while Yadav was clinical with his sweep shots against spinners both in front of square and behind the wickets.
Chennai had struggled to accelerate in the first half of its innings and reached 82-3 in 12 overs before Jadeja and Dube tried to up the ante with a 79-run stand off 50 balls.
Jasprit Bumrah (2-25) restrained Chennai late when Dube holed out at deep mid-wicket and Dhoni flicked the fast bowler’s low full toss straight to deep square leg.
Kohli leads another masterful chase
Bengaluru made amends for its loss to Punjab at home just two days previously as Kohli and Devdutt Padikkal featured in a productive 103-run second-wicket stand off 69 balls to seal the game.
Padikkal didn’t allow premier Punjab spinner Yuzvendra Chahal to settle, hitting him over long-on on the first ball he faced from the leg-spinner. He was four sixes and five fours to reach 61 from 35 balls before he was finally out to Harpreet Brar in the 13th over.
Kohli, who hit five boundaries in the batting powerplay, raised his 50 off 43 balls before adding two more boundaries and a six in his match-winning innings.
Earlier, Bengaluru spinners Krunal Pandya and Suyash Sharma tied down the Punjab batters with four wickets for 51 runs off their combined eight overs.
Fast bowler Romario Shepherd, playing his first IPL game of the season, got the big wicket of captain Shreyas Iyer (6) in his first over as Punjab slipped to 68-3 in the eighth over.
Josh Hazlewood and Bhuvneshwar Kumar returned to the attack late and didn’t allow the lower order to accelerate. Shashank Singh (31 not out) and Marco Jansen (25 not out) were kept quiet.
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The Associated Press
